"General Valery Zaluzhny's Thesis Has Been Confirmed."

• 12.05.2026, 13:13

The WSU is betting on drones.

A number of Western publications write about serious changes in the war in Ukraine: there are signs that Russia is losing the initiative. The AFU is increasingly not only holding back the Russian offensive, but also beginning to impose the course of the war on the Kremlin.

Is Ukraine really now seizing the initiative in the war? In what way is it manifested?

The site Charter97.org put these questions to the Ukrainian politician, former deputy of the Verkhovna Rada Boryslav Bereza:

- A few days ago the regiment "Azov" officially posted a video showing how it controls the roads and suburbs of Mariupol with its drones, destroying military equipment and military facilities.

If you look at the map, even in a straight line it is 120 kilometers. That is in fact today Ukraine, thanks to the effective actions of the military and innovative developments, has learned to gain an advantage on the battlefield through drones. This once again emphasizes and confirms the thesis of General Valeriy Zaluzhny that the war is moving into a technological phase and it is still necessary to deal with drones, ground robotic complexes, which should perform the main functionality on the battlefield. Thanks to drones and the fact that there is a certain advantage in some technological aspects, the AFU manages to achieve positive results on the battlefield.

In addition, we should not forget about one more thing. Russia has really started to have problems, and mobilization has begun to limp on both feet. Until February 2026, Russia officially admitted to mobilizing an average of 38,000 to 40,000 to 43,000 people each month who signed contracts. In February, for the first time, it was 19,000; in March, it was 16,000.

This is not 38,000 or 40,000. If you calculate that the Russians' killed, wounded, and total sanitary losses are on the order of 30-35 thousand, then all those contracted don't make up for those Russia loses on the battlefield. And if we add to this the mass AWOL (AWOL) and the serious problems with the Russians now being unable to man their units, Ukraine has for the first time begun to achieve parity on the battlefield.

Although the Russians have advances in certain places, and indeed they do, but they only manage to do so due to the fact that on these parts of the front Ukraine lacks the personnel of units that could hold the defense there. But if we compensate for this issue, and this can be done by solving the problem of mobilization, SOCh and terms of service, then we can talk about a break in the war.

- Can the new situation force Putin to negotiate in the near future?

- Putin may or may not want to negotiate now, but there are forces that can force him to negotiate. China, for example.

That's why we need to keep a close eye on the next meeting between Donald Trump and Si Jinping, which effectively becomes Yalta 2.0. And at this Yalta, three wars will be decided. One war is Russia against Ukraine, another war is in Iran, and a potential war is over Taiwan. So new security formats will be considered there and the conditions in which the world now finds itself will be rewritten.

For China, this is necessary for three reasons. The first is the reputational pluses they get: America couldn't get it done, and we're such peacemakers, we'll do it. The second, and this is also quite important, is the expectation of a so-called economic miracle. The war in Ukraine and the war in Iran are preventing China from becoming the number one economy in the world, and this is clearly spelled out in the Chinese Communist Party's plan and is Xi's main goal.

Third, and this is very important, is reshaping the world for China. The PRC actively wants to move towards Europe, the war in Ukraine is blocking the ability to buy ports in Marseille, Hamburg and the rest of the places they want to buy them to gain control of the supply chains. Reminder: China is not at war with weapons, China is at war with yuan. So China, for its trade expansion, sees the truce as an opportunity.

There are also reasons for the U.S. that are just pushing Trump and pushing him to also agree that these three issues need to be addressed.

The first reason is, of course, the election. There will be a US election on November 3, and if the Republican Party loses both houses of parliament, Trump could get not only impeached, but even the end of his reign. This is what a lot of people are talking about. So he needs a solution to this problem now.

The second reason: all three wars - two actual and one potential - carry threats to the world economy. Solving these problems will help Trump and the U.S. solve its economic problems that it has.

And the third is also Trump's dream of a Nobel Peace Prize. Although many believe that this is a minor factor, Trump's entourage believes that this is one of Trump's dominant motivations, so he will agree.

The most important thing here is that neither negotiator - neither Xi nor Trump - wants to simply crush the other. If they can come to an agreement, as the Allies once did in Yalta in 1945, then we will soon see not only the aid tap being turned on for Russia, whose economy is not in the best shape right now and which, even because of higher oil prices, can't make up for its entire budget deficit, but also China urging Putin to make the decision to end the war. And Putin's wishes will be the last thing to be considered here. Because if suddenly tomorrow the shipment of components for drones stops, Russia will be forced to make such conditions. 99% of components in Russia come from China.

By the way, this is also true of Ukraine. One should realize that China is a rather serious instrument of pressure on the decision-making process.

The US can dominate and put pressure on Ukraine and Europe in the same way. For example, by stopping the supply of missiles for Patriot or some other way. So at this point, what happens in Beijing could have implications for ending the war.

- What else can Ukraine do to make Putin more accommodating?"

- Ukraine needs to stabilize the front. If the Russians finally lose advancement on the front, if it becomes permanently static, and unfortunately, we must admit, it is already turning into a trench warfare of the World War I format, then Putin will have no other options but to move to negotiations.

Because he will lose resources, he will lose his soldiers, he will lose equipment, and there will be no advancement. If this result is achieved, the war will end in an even more accelerated mode.